


Friend of the Family

by speakpirate



Category: The Family (TV 2016)
Genre: Bring Them Back Fic Challenge, F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-08
Updated: 2016-09-08
Packaged: 2018-08-13 22:10:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7987948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/speakpirate/pseuds/speakpirate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Danny was drunk.  He was high.  He went to the woods to look at the bunker where Adam was kept.  He tripped and fell.  Case closed.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>But she doesn’t like leaving things to chance.</i>
</p><p>A story where Bridey lives and continues to be a pretty terrible person.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Friend of the Family

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [Bring_Them_Back_Fic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bring_Them_Back_Fic/pseuds/Bring_Them_Back_Fic) in the [Bring_Them_Back_Fic_Television](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/Bring_Them_Back_Fic_Television) collection. 



> **Prompt:**
> 
> Character: Bridey Cruz
> 
> Cause of Death: Political Conspiracy / Sibling Love Triangle
> 
> Deathisode: What Took So Long (1x12)
> 
> Write a story where Bridey lives.

She gets a text from Willa, asking her to meet. It has to be somewhere no one will see, but that’s part of what makes it hot. A dark alley. The front seat of Bridey’s car. 

This time it’s GPS coordinates. It’s not a hook up, either. It’s an exclusive.

Willa’s going to show her the bunker.

This is huge. Book contract huge. From lesbian lifestyle blogger to New York Times Bestseller list in six months or less. She’ll fictionalize it. Knowing what she knows about Adam, it’s the only way. And hell, if the truth comes out, she can maybe get a sequel. 

She can almost taste the money in the air. The miniature quiches they’ll serve at the cocktail party for the release. The governor will be there, Willa will give it the green light. She can offer to donate some of the profits to a charity for missing kids or something. It doesn’t have to be much. Just enough to make it look good.

She turns down a single lane access road. Road is a generous term, really it’s tire ruts worn down against the patchy grass and dirt. Her headlights gleam on a car parked up ahead, a familiar figure stretched out on the hood, staring up at the stars.

_Fuck._

It’s not Willa.

It’s Danny.

She slows the car down. Grabs the taser from her glove compartment and slides it quickly into her pocket. Plasters a smile on her face, like she’s just fucking delighted to see him right now.

“If I’d known it was you, I would have brought a bottle.”

“Don’t need one.” He always needs one. He must have brought his own.

She keeps her right hand in her pocket. “What do you want, Danny?”

He hops down off the hood. His eyes are red and his pupils are massive. 

“C’mon,” he says. “Told ya I’d show you the bunker.”

She eyes him suspiciously. Could he have been so high he didn’t even realize he was texting from Willa’s phone? Maybe he’s not actually smart enough to set up a trap. He’s not a thinker.

“C’mon,” he says again, waving at her from the edge of the tree line. “Do you wanna see it or not?”

Her caution says no. Her ambition says yes.

She follows him into the woods.

The air is cold. It might snow later. 

Their footsteps crunch along in silence. After three quarters of a mile, he stops.

“You knew.”

_Damn it._

“I know a lot of things.”

“You knew. And you didn’t tell me. You let me fuck you senseless to get information, but you didn’t even tell me he’s not my brother!”

“I also didn’t tell the police. Or my readers. Or Lester Holt on Dateline. Your family owes me.”

“Does Willa owe you? Are you blackmailing her?”

“Willa’s a big girl. She makes her own decisions.”

He moves closer to her. The smell of whiskey so strong, it stings her nostrils.

“She’s not like me. She’s a good person.”

Bridey bites back a laugh. None of them are good people. Herself included.

“Is this funny to you?” His face twists into angry lines. “There’s a lot of weird shit going on right now. But I am not going to let you ruin my family.”

That’s when she sees the rock in his hand. 

He lunges towards her, he’s still got that old high school athlete buried under all the booze, he’s quick and graceful.

Not quick enough.

She tases him in the groin.

He falls backward heavily, stumbles over a tree root. She watches as his head hits a large rock, hears his skull crack against it right before his eyes go glassy.

She steps back. There’s blood pooling all over the ground. She can’t afford to get any on her shoes. 

She thinks fast. It’s self-defense, but the Warrens will see it as an easy way to get her off their backs, locked away where she can’t tell anyone their secrets. They’d consider Danny a good trade.

She searches his coat, finds the fifth of whiskey in the inside pocket. She splashes it on his jacket, wipes her prints off with her scarf. She drops the bottle next to him.

Plan A. He was drunk. He was high. He went to the woods to look at the bunker where Adam was kept. He tripped and fell. Case closed.

They might notice the taser marks. But only if they’re looking. She wonders if the lady detective swings both ways. A little insurance never hurts. She could drop a hint that he was into some kinky stuff.

But she doesn’t like leaving things to chance.

She hikes back to the car. She still has an envelope of hair she stole from Adam’s brush. Just in case she needed to replicate the lab results. She takes a pair of eyebrow tweezers from her purse and plucks a few of them out.

She goes back to the body, gently places a few of them under Danny’s bitten down fingernails.

Plan B. It wasn’t an accident. Someone tased him. There was a struggle. He’s must have met someone here, near the bunker where Adam was kept. Adam. They’ll run his DNA. Find out it’s not really him. Figure Danny had found out. A confrontation. A fight. Danny grabbed him by the hair and Adam killed him. Case closed.

She’s back at her car, about to drive away, when she thinks about the text message. His car is unlocked. Willa’s phone is on the passenger seat. The passcode is easy to crack. The date Adam went missing.

She deletes the Sent Messages. What if the Warrens close ranks, though? Bribe the lab again. Pay one their minions to start a fire in the evidence room. They’re ruthless enough. Anything is possible.

She dials the landline at the Warren house from Willa’s phone. She imagines the signal pinging off the closest cell towers, pinning down the location. The wall phone at the Warren’s is a relic from the nineties. No caller id.

Willa answers on the second ring. 

Bridey is already sobbing. She chokes out the barest details. She’s been trying to call her for hours. Danny found out about them. He tried to hurt her. There was an accident and now -”

“Where are you?” Willa asks, her voice clipped and efficient. “I’ll be right there.”

Plan C. Willa and Danny got into a fight. Over his drinking. Over who was to blame for Adam getting taken in the first place. Over a girl. A reporter who rejected him to be with his sister. It turned violent. She can cry on the witness stand about how Danny threatened to out them, said it would embarrass the governor. Everyone would believe her. The Warrens would make sure of it. She and Willa could become a power couple. Get some dirt on Congressman Wilson, force him to retire and clear a path to DC.

Willa pulls up twenty minutes later in her father’s car. With a hood and a baseball cap concealing her face. Traffic cameras. Bridey pictures her blowing through a light to make sure they got a picture. Maybe she even programed the location into his GPS.

Plan D. Daddy did it. Sick to death of his son being an embarrassment to the family.

Bridey makes sure her lip trembles enough to make her seem vulnerable. Willa puts an arm around her as they walk back out to the scene of the crime.

Willa nods approvingly, unmoved by the sight of the body. “I’ll file a missing persons report in the morning. What did you do with the taser?” 

“Smashed it,” Bridey lies. “I’ll throw the pieces in the water.”

“Good. You should leave town. Head down to Boston for a few days. Or New York. Get a story ready to go, a good one. Danny Warren and his drinking, the drugs, all the rehabs that kicked him out, the car show models he’d get coked up with in some sleazy motel.”

“I quit my job.”

“When this breaks? The Globe will pay top dollar for it. And it’ll help sell the narrative. A tragic accident. A family that was healing broken apart by another senseless twist of fate.”

God, she’s going to spin it so it helps them. So Adam won’t be the son all the reporters want to ask about. Add another veil of grief over their personal life. 

It should buy them three years of no tough questions. Maybe more.

She kisses Willa hard against the car door. Willa kisses back, but pulls away as things start to heat up. “I have things to do.”

Bridey imagines her buying a taser somewhere in New Hampshire. Planting it and a spare set of car keys in an old coffee can in Hank Asher’s garage.

Plan E. The creepy sex offender did it. He wanted revenge against the Warrens. He killed Danny in cold blood so he could frame John. Another reason for biometric monitoring. To protect innocent people from monsters like him.

She gets in the car and drives off without looking back.


End file.
